Sir, – Seamus Kilgannon (October 23rd) of the Irish League of Credit Unions notes with apparent satisfaction that the State is to avoid a projected €230 million spend on credit unions. He omits to mention that the State found itself needing to budget for that contingency in the first place because of how credit unions organised their internal affairs. He also omits to mention that the Credit Union Restructuring Board is expected to spend €20 million of public money in support of the multibillion euro credit union movement by the time the board winds up in March 2016.
There is also the burden on the public purse through the Credit Institutions Resolution Fund, where expenditure to date is reported at €27 million.
Meanwhile, the enabling provisions for community investment, contained in Section 44 of the Credit Union Act 1997, remain untouched by the credit union movement. What might that fund have achieved, in terms, say, of social housing, had it been applied over the last 18 years?
And the credit union movement has managed to maintain a distance between itself and the Dormant Accounts Acts, despite the clearly expressed intention of the minister who introduced that legislation and despite repeated recommendations of the Dormant Account Board, of which I was a member.
As a 30-year credit union member, I look forward to congratulating my local credit union, and the movement as a whole, on one day seizing Section 44 and the opportunity to be part of the dormant accounts regime, so staking its definitive claim to be the credit institution “at the heart of the community”. – Yours, etc,
DES GUNNING,
Dublin 7.